


cut your teeth

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Civil War Team Iron Man, Gen, Non-Linear Narrative, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Tony Stark Has Issues, angst like woah, questionable science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-29
Updated: 2017-09-29
Packaged: 2019-01-06 17:03:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12215100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: It starts with a slip. It’s so minor really-just a mismatched name, but one so easily mistaken for a slight.On a Tuesday, he calls her Natalie. She has the conscience to be offended, as she always has when it comes to him- but the look on his face when he remembers that what he has said is incorrect is unmistakable. That is not anger or spite in his expression. It is shock.His eyes furrow for a second but he has been in this game too long, and is quick enough to cover his misstep. The tremor in his hand is almost unnoticeable by the time he’s making eyes at the next smarmy business type.(Or, Tony erases the Avengers from his memory. They catch on.)





	cut your teeth

It starts with a slip. It’s so minor really-just a mismatched name, but one so easily mistaken for a slight.

On a Tuesday, he calls her Natalie. She has the conscience to be offended, as she always has when it comes to him- but the look on his face when he remembers that what he has said is incorrect is unmistakable. That is not anger or spite in his expression. It is shock.

His eyes furrow for a second but he has been in this game too long, and is quick enough to cover his misstep. The tremor in his hand is almost unnoticeable by the time he’s making eyes at the next smarmy business type.

It is her who is stuck in the same spot staring after him. She has an eyebrow raised and her gaze is questioning. Something is off here, but the ground between them is too shaky for her to insert herself where she is not wanted.

“What did he say to you?” Steve asks, coming up behind her, and his words are tinged with an anger that he reserves for nobody else. It is not his natural state, but it is hard to break. Tony has always left an explosive air around them, and lately they are volatile in it’s wake.

She doesn’t turn to face him, but she crosses her arms.

“He called me Natalie,” She says, and the look in the Captain’s eyes is enough to belly any beast. She can tell that he wants to move, so she puts her hand on his chest to hold him back.

“Natasha, let me handle this.”

“Steve. It wasn’t like that. The look on his face...I think he genuinely forgot.”

Recognition dawns on him then, and he deflates under her hand. He’s not an expressive man, but she is a spy, and she knows worry when she sees it. He steels himself, and it’s almost like the air has gotten thinner around them.

“Something’s wrong.”

*

They think he created the system as a way to relive memories, as a therapeutic way to actively deal with your past- but B.A.R.F. is so much more than that.

(He doesn’t tell anybody that the idea only came to him as a way to remember what his mother’s face looked like without makeup, the way his father smiled at her over the newspaper. He was losing more and more of them everyday.)

After a few trials with the product it became clear that not only could he relive the past, but with a little bit of tinkering, he could recreate it. Choosing bits and pieces- he could decide which pains he could afford to erase, and which ones he has to keep. Afghanistan, for example, as a turning point in his life, has to stay. Obadiah has to stay. Some things are too integral to who he is, or who he needs to be, to tamper with. Others are not.

*

(Natalie Rushman- Preferred; Natasha Romanov- Not Recommended.)

*

He hesitates before starting. He wonders if he's crossing a line with this. Using B.A.R.F. like this is dangerous and untested, but who would make a better test subject than him? Trauma practically seeks him out, and he is tired of drowning in betrayal and regret. Besides- name a person who doesn't wish that they could change the past. The only difference between him and everybody else is that he can actually make it happen.

*

Another punching bag down, Steve stops to catch his breath.

“It could be his health?”

“He is getting up in age,” Natasha says, wiping her hands from where she was holding the bag to spot him.

“Don’t let him hear you say that.”

Across the training room, Clint shoots an arrow into the now down bag and calls out, “It’s Stark. If it’s his health he would’ve made some crazy invention to deal with it by now.”

Leaning back against the wall now, Natasha asks,“So what do you think it is?”

Clint shrugs. Steve has already replaced the bag and resumed his training.

*

It’s arduous work. Unless he wants to succumb to amnesia then he can’t just remove the memories. He has to replace what he takes out, with something that fits.

Every detail is meticulously planned, as not to disrupt the rest of the timeline in his mind. There are notes taken, there are storyboards drawn up. He is an engineer, after all, and his handiwork has never been something to scoff at.

*

As it turns out, Captain America has to stay. It is not an option to forget what Howard made of him. Captain America was the icon that twisted his childhood, and tainted his self perception well into adulthood. The simple fact is that he cannot be done away with. Steve Rogers, on the other hand, is a different story.

*

He knows who Ant-Man is by now. He has seen the man enough times to know that his name is Scott, and that he is Hank Pym’s little protege. The fact that he has never acknowledged knowing this, by the time that he no longer does, is pure luck. When Scott approaches him at a convention in west LA for electrical engineering, trailing slightly behind Hank Pym, and tries to start a conversation with him, he is cut off immediately by a quick, “Who are you?”

Scott turns on his heel, groans, and walks off- failing to notice that this time, at least, it was an actual question.

*

“I don’t even know what I did to the guy!”

Scott throws his hands up and falls back onto the couch. His whining is almost childlike, when he throws his arm to cover his eyes, and stifles a huff.

Sam, beside Scott, rolls his eyes. He’s had this conversation with far too many people lately, and he just wants to watch the news without running commentary from his team mates.

“It’s just how he is man,” he gets out, and flips the channel to some cartoon that he doesn’t have to pay attention to.

*

Steve tries to call him, after the Scott incident. He doesn’t recognize the caller I.D., and he’s busy working anyways, so he doesn’t answer. He does listen to the voicemail, though.

Steve asks him if everything is alright, says he’s there for him if he needs somebody. He says he would’ve come to check on him in person, but he wasn’t sure if he would even be allowed in the tower, after everything.

He deletes the voicemail after the first listen. He spends an hour wondering why Steve would no longer be allowed in the tower, before caving and asking FRIDAY. She says that she is no longer permitted, by his own orders, to give him that information. She won’t tell him what became of JARVIS either.

*

He decides that the wormhole will be the last thing that he erases. Thanos has come and gone (that memory altered to a news story that Tony Stark had absentmindedly glanced at, and not a bloody, brutal battle that Iron Man had fought in), but in his dreams he still chokes on the stars. Lately, they taste more like dust than blood, and he almost considers letting them stay- if only for recognizing that it’s his fear that’s always driven him to new heights. But they have to go, or the whole process falls apart.

*

“Jim, you have to see that something’s off here.”

Jim swivels in his chair to shoot a glare at Steve and Natasha. He rubs his hands over his face and breaths in deeply to calm himself before replying.

“Of course I know that something’s wrong. But Tones...He cut all of us off. He won’t let anybody see him. I talked with Pepper the other day. She said he forgot that he made her CEO…” at this Natasha and Steve share a look, “...she said he just shrugged it off.”

“He’s been doing that a lot lately,” Natasha says, and Jim closes his eyes to her words. Steve catches the flinch, and stares him down.

“You know what this is.”

It’s not a question. Rhodes’ fists clench at his sides.

“Did you ever watch his presentation on B.A.R.F.?”

They both nod. The technology had been offered to Bucky, after all.

“You think-” Natasha starts, but Jim cuts her off.

“I’ve known Tony since he was fourteen, I know exactly what he can do.”

“Oh, Tony…”

*

FRIDAY screens everything before he sees it now. It’s increasingly rare for him to make a public appearance. Research & Development for Stark Industries has never been more active. One day he catches the Avengers on the news for battling a witch in New Delhi. He does not recognize The Vision, The Falcon, or The Scarlet Witch, but he’s glad to see that his decision not to sign into the Avengers Initiative after the Chitauri Invasion has not stopped their ranks from growing. He does briefly wonder where Dr.Banner and Thor are. He doesn’t notice when the reporter mentions Iron Man because FRIDAY has already cut the feed.

*

They can’t disable his tech to get to him. FRIDAY is too advanced for any hacker to get through. They consult every scientist they know- From Erik Selvig to Hank Pym. The results are the same every time. The tower is a fortress that they cannot penetrate. They do consider physical force- but that risks injuring anybody inside. They can only lie and wait for Tony to come out now, and try their best to reverse the damage when he does.

*

He doesn’t make an appearance until the Stark Expo. By then it is no longer the stars that keep him awake, but Afghanistan again. He speaks about his parent’s legacy when he takes the stage, and when he says that they died in a car crash, as far as he knows, he is not lying.

The Avengers attend as an ensemble. Tony tells the press that he is thrilled to have them here, that Howard would’ve been honored to see Captain America at his expo once more.

The good captain taps him on the shoulder while he is speaking to another industry head, and he doesn’t hesitate to shake the man’s hand.

“Ah, Captain Rogers, it’s good to have you here.”

Steve smiles sadly back at him. This is not the new start he had wanted with Tony, but it is the one that he has.

“It’s good to be here. You do brilliant work, Mr.Stark.”


End file.
